About Us

Chair on Holocaust Studies

Twenty years ago The "1939" Club established a chair on the Holocaust Studies at UCLA, the first such chair in a public University in the United States. A distinguished list of Holocaust scholars have taught under the auspices of the Chair including Israel Gutman, Ezra Mendelsohn, Michael Marrus and Shlomo Aronson. In 1987 Professor Saul Friedlander became the permanent holder of the Chair. (See profile on Professor Friedlander).

UCLA Lecture Series

Jewish Berlin

The "1939" Club, through its Education Fund and the UCLA Center for Jewish Studies, sponsored the fifth event in its ongoing series on Great European Jewish Cities on October 26, 1997, at UCLA. This series explores the rich, cultural diversity of Jewish urban life in Europe prior to the Holocaust.

Understanding the vibrancy of Jewish life in Europe prior to World War II places in perspective the enormous destruction wrought by the Holocaust. The series features international renowned lecturers often accompanied by film or panel discussions.

The Jewish Berlin lecture featured a prominent young scholar, Michael Brenner, who focused on the city that was simultaneously a vibrant center of Jewish culture in modern times, and home to the most horrendous efforts to destroy the Jewish people, Berlin.

Michael Brenner is Professor of Jewish History and Culture at the University of Munich, and an expert in modern European Jewish history. Professor Brenner earned his doctorate from Columbia University, and has taught at Brandeis and at Indiana University. He is author of numerous books and articles, including The Renaissance of Jewish Culture in Weimar Germany (Yale University Press, 1996; forthcoming in German), and has also co-authored volume 2 of German Jewish History in Modern Times, 1780-1871 (Columbia University Press, 1997), which has also been published in German and Hebrew.

Professor Brenner's talk focused primarily on the Weimar years, the period between World War One and 1933. These years were a brief but unique period in German and Jewish history, when it would be impossible to imagine German culture without its many Jewish scholars, writers, artists, and musicians. In this period Berlin also hosted a plethora of Hebrew and Yiddish intellectuals. Professor Brenner concluded his lecture with brief comments on Jewish life in Berlin today.

The audience was welcomed by Professor Arnold Band, Acting Director, UCLA Center for Jewish Studies and Dr. Sam Goetz, Education Chair of The "1939" Club. A panel discussion followed the lecture.

Jewish Prague

Jewish Prague was the subject of the most recent lecture of The "1939" Club's Great European Jewish Cities in the Modern Age. The lecture, in cooperation with the UCLA Center for Jewish Studies, was delivered at UCLA on March 15, 1998, by Professor Hillel Kievel who is currently Professor of History and Stroum Professor of Jewish Studies at the University of Washington in Seattle. He is a specialist in modern anti-Semitism. He is the author of The Making of Czech Jewry: National Conflict and Jewish Society in Bohemia (Oxford University Press, 1988), Languages of Community: The Historical Experience of Czech Jewry, 1780-1918 (forthcoming, University of California Press), and Blood Inscriptions: Explorations into the Modern Ritual Murder Trail (also forthcoming).

Professor Kieval has been named to the Gloria M. Goldstein Chair in Jewish History and Thought at Washington University in St. Louis.
Previous cities highlighted were Vienna, Vilna, Budapest, Warsaw and Berlin.

Jewish Salonika

The Center for Jewish Studies and the "1939" Club Holocaust Memorial Fund sponsored the seventh event in the ongoing series on Great Jewish Cities. The series debuted in May 1996 with a highly successful event devoted to Jewish Vienna. Following the Vienna event were lectures on Jewish Vilna, Budapest, Warsaw, Berlin, and Prague.

It is the aim of the Great Cities series to explore the rich cultural diversity of Jewish urban life prior to the Holocaust. Understanding the vibrancy of Jewish life provides a measure of historical perspective for the enormous destruction that the Holocaust wrought.

Aron Rodrigue was the guest lecturer. Professor Rodrigue is the Professor of History and Eva Chernov Lokey Professor in Jewish Studies at Stanford University, and an expert in modern Jewish history. He is author of numerous books, including Images of Sephardi and Eastern Jewries in Transition, 1860-1939: The Teachers of Alliance Israelite Universelle (University of Washington Press, 1993). He is co-author of The Jews of Balkans: The Judeo-Spanish Community, 15th to 20th Centuries (Blackwell Publishers, 1995) and editor of Ottoman and Turkish Jewry: Community and Leadership (Indian University Turkish Studies Series, 1992). He is also the 1994 recipient of the National Jewish Book Council Honor Award in Sephardic Studies. Professor Rodrigue's lecture dealt with the Greek city of Salonika (today Thessaloniki) which boasted one of the largest and most culturally vibrant Sephardic Jewish communities in the world. At times comprising nearly half of the city's population, the Jews of Salonika played an important role in the commercial and social life of this port town. However, following the German invasion of 1941, the overwhelming majority of Salonika's Jews were deported to Poland, where they were killed in Nazi death camps. The lecture will be held on Sunday, April 29, 1999 at 1:00 pm at UCLA Thomas Bradley International Hall.

Jewish Sarajevo Explored

On Sunday, March 12, 2000, Professor Moshe Lazar of the University of Southern California presented a free lecture about Jewish Sarajevo before World War II, under the auspices of U.C.L.A.’s Center for Jewish Studies. His Excellency Sven Alkalaj, Bosnian Ambassador to the United States introduced the subject to a packed audience.

Having recently emerged from the ravages of violent conflict, Sarajevo possesses a long history of peaceful multi-ethnic co-existence. Among the important elements of that mix was the Jewish community of Sarajevo, whose first major wave of settlers came from the Sephardic community of Salonika during the second half of the 16^th century.

During the following century, the Ashkenazi Jews began making their way to the commercial center in Sarajevo. There, they were later joined by Jews from other Balkan lands as well as from Italy.

By the end of the 19^th century—by which time Sarajevo had fallen from Ottoman to Austro-Hungarian rule, the city’s Jewish population reached 10,000. That figure rose to 14,000 after World War I.

However, the tradition of mutual respect among the city’s religious and ethnic groups was shattered during World War II, when Fascist allies of the Nazis attacked Sarajevo’s Jews and presided over the destruction of the community.

Today, the Jewish community is struggling to reestablish itself.

The Center for Jewish Studies at U.C.L.A. with the generous support of Dr. & Mrs. Andrew Viterbi was proud to sponsor this ninth event in the on-going series on Great Jewish Cities. The series debuted in May 1996 with a highly successful lecture devoted to Jewish Vienna. Lectures on Jewish Vilna, Budapest, Warsaw, Berlin, Prague, Salonika, and Paris followed.

Watch your mailbox for announcements of future Great Jewish Cities lectures.

Memorial Lecture

The first "1939" Club Holocaust Memorial Fund Lecture was delivered by Professor Alvin H. Rosenfeld, on April 19, 1998 at UCLA. The title of Professor Rosenfeld's lecture was "Whose Holocaust? American Culture and the Rhetoric of Victimization." Professor Rosenfeld is Professor of English and Director of the Jewish Studies Program at Indiana University. He earned his doctorate in English Literature from Brown University, and has taught at Brown , at Indiana University, at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem, and at the University of Kiel in German. He has been awarded a number of National Endowment for the Humanities Fellowships, as well as two Mellon Travel Grants. He is an editorial board member of numerous journals, including Shoah: Review of Holocaust Studies, Shofar: An Inter-disciplinary Journal of Jewish Studies of Judische Studien, of Holocaust and Genocide Studies. He has coedited Confronting the Holocaust: The Impact of Elie Wiesel (Indiana University, 1970): edited Thinking About the Holocaust After Half a Century (Indiana University Press, 1997); and is the author of numerous books and articles, including Imagining Hitler (Indiana University Press, 1985), and A Double Dying: Reflections on Holocaust Literature (Indiana University Press, 1980).

SAUL FRIEDLANDER

In what has become an annual tradition, members of the Board of Directors had an opportunity to dine with Professor Saul Friedlander, holder of The "1939" Club chair on Holocaust Studies on Sunday April 19, 1998, at the Beverly Hilton Hotel. The event was organized by Arrangement Chairman Henryk Leman. Professor Friedlander provided members of the Board with valuable insight into the German debate on a planned Holocaust memorial, the interest of German youth in the Holocaust, the findings of important Holocaust related documents in the archives of the former Communist states and his work on the Independent Commission of Experts, established in 1996 by the Swiss Parliament to examine the historical and legal aspects of Switzerland's role during WWII, especially the financial and commercial relations between Switzerland and the Third Reich,Swiss policy on refugees and foreign nationals and questions concerning the way in which events there have been recorded.

Jewish Resistance

Professor Yehuda Bauer, one of the most pre-eminent Holocaust scholars and this years’ recipient of The Israel Prize, delivered The “1939” Club Memorial Lecture commemorating Jewish resistance activities during the Second World War. The lecture was entitled “Jewish Reactions to Nazi Policies During the Holocaust.” The event was co-sponsored by the UCLA Center for Jewish Studies and the American Society for Yad Vashem. The lecture was in memory of past “1939” Club Board Members: Shirley Dishman, David Klipp, Selma Steinberg and Charlotte Zelon. Prior to the lecture members of The “1939” Club had dinner with Professor Bauer at the UCLA Faculty Center. Dr. Sam Goetz, Education Chairman, was instrumental in organizing the event.

UCLA HOLOCAUST HISTORIAN NAMED MACARTHUR FELLOW

UCLA historian Saul Friedlander, who holds UCLA's “1939” Club Chair in Holocaust Studies, was named a MacArthur Fellow on June 23, 1999. Friedlander will receive a grant from the MacArthur Foundation of $375,000 over five years. Individuals cannot apply for MacArthur Fellowships. Recipients are nominated and selected anonymously. UCLA's “1939” Club Chair is the first endowed chair in a public university in the United States devoted to Holocaust Studies.

Friedlander, a scholar of the Third Reich and the Holocaust, has "transformed our understanding of this period by weaving into a coherent whole the perspectives of the participants: ordinary Germans, party activists, military and political figures, and, most importantly, victims and survivors," the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation said in a statement announcing this year's 32 fellows. "Drawing from documents, films, recollections, and his personal experience, he reconstructs these events with a judicious tone that defies the nature of the subject. By enhancing our understanding of the nature and meaning of the Holocaust, Friedlander demonstrates the interplay of memory and representation in the interpretation of historic events."

Nazi Germany was one of the most advanced nations in the world, yet most Germans "looked the other way" as Hitler systematically persecuted Germany's Jews in a prelude to the Holocaust, Friedlander wrote in his chilling 1997 book, Nazi Germany and the Jews, Volume 1: The Years of Persecution, 1933- 1939" (HarperCollins). The book, which covers the period from Hitler's rise to power to the outbreak of World War II, has been praised as the definitive history of Nazi policies prior to the Holocaust. Friedlander characterizes 1930s Germany as a world "grotesque and chilling under the veneer of an even more chilling normality."

The great majority of Germans in the 1930s "espoused traditional anti-Semitism in one form or another," but neither demanded nor opposed anti-Jewish measures, which most Germans considered a peripheral issue, wrote Friedlander. Most of the largely middle class, educated population of Germany accepted Nazi policies against the Jews and ignored the systematic removal of Jews from Germany's government, business and cultural life.

Friedlander made extensive use of new documents in his research, including local German police reports. "Among most 'ordinary Germans' there was acquiescence regarding the segregation and dismissal of the Jews from civil service" -employment which in pre-war Germany included judges, doctors in public hospitals and university professors, among many others, Friedlander wrote. "There was some glee in witnessing their degradation, but outside party ranks, there was no massive agitation to expel them from Germany or to unleash violence against them."

The German majority did not advocate violence against the Jews, but when Hitler pursued a policy of total extermination in 1941, the "hundreds of thousands of 'ordinary Germans' who actively participated in the killings acted no differently from the equally numerous and 'ordinary' Austrians, Rumanians, Ukrainians, Balts and other Europeans who became the most willing operatives of the murder machinery functioning in their midst," Friedlander wrote.

In Hitler, "cold calculation and blind fury coexisted and could find almost simultaneous expression," Friedlander wrote. Yet very few of the approximately 525,000 Jews living in Germany in January 1933 sensed the implications or foresaw the terror to come. A small number of Jewish artists and intellectuals left Germany almost immediately after Hitler's rise to power, but the vast majority of German Jews felt "no apparent sense of panic or urgency," Friedlander wrote. Even by the end of 1933, when tens of millions of people inside and outside Germany were aware of the Nazis' "systematic policy of segregation and persecution" against the Jews, the majority felt anxiety but no need to leave the country.

Jews who left Nazi Germany lost virtually everything they owned, Friedlander noted. The vast majority of German Jews knew they would face continued discrimination, but thought they could maintain their livelihood in Germany, he said. By January 1939, Jews were forced by law to sell their businesses and valuables, such as land, stock, jewels and works or art. By 1939, the Nazis had "entirely destroyed any remaining possibility for Jewish life in Germany," Friedlander said. That November, all Jewish children still attending German schools were expelled. The same year, Hitler approved the mass murder of handicapped children and mentally ill adults.

Throughout the 1930s, no powerful voice within Germany was raised against the Nazi regime. With very few exceptions, the Protestant and Catholic Churches were silent; no criticism or protest came from German universities. By 1939, virtually every American newspaper published editorials condemning the Nazis, but U.S. policies toward Germany did not change, he said. France, unlike other democratic countries, failed to offer even a symbolic gesture of protest against the Nazis.

Hitler did not hint what the final goal of his anti-Jewish policy would be in his first years in power, Friedlander said. His main goal toward the Jews in the late 1930s was to force their emigration to a distant country after confiscating their wealth. Friedlander finds no evidence of any plans for total extermination of the Jews prior to Germany's invasion of the Soviet Union.

When Germany annexed Austria in March 1938, the persecution of Austrian Jews, especially in Vienna, outpaced the persecution in Germany, Friedlander says. "Public humiliation was more blatant and sadistic; expropriation better organized; forced emigration more rapid," and the Austrians "relished the public shows of degradation," he writes.

Friedlander's other books include History, Memory, and the Extermination of the Jews, (1993), Reflections of Nazism, (1984), and When Memory Comes (1979). He is the senior editor of the journal History and Memory.

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